to devour one's own tail
by Domenic
Summary: Mirai/Future timeline. Pre-canon. Not too long after leaving the incubation chamber, Cell gets a real taste of the flaws plaguing his imperfect body.


**Title: to devour one's own tail**

**Fandom: Dragon Ball Z**

**Summary: Mirai timeline. Pre-canon. Not too long after leaving the incubation chamber, Cell gets a real taste of the flaws plaguing his imperfect body. **

**Warning(s): Violence/death; exploring a younger Cell not completely grown into his own yet (physically and mentally)**

**A/N: So, Cell is my #1 favorite DBZ character, and I'm finally writing down one of the many plotbunnies he's inspired in my head. Besides thanking the original source material, thanks to Dragon Ball Abridged/Team Four Star, stupidoomdoodles, smalsa, Masquerade, Genro, the ultimateperfection1 website, plotdesigner, irontonic for DBZ fic inspiration. Like above warning suggests, exploring a number of things about Cell and the doomed timeline with this fic and probably taking liberties and making theories, such as the theory going a bit into the nature of Cell's need to absorb bio extract while in his Imperfect body (and also going a bit into a younger Cell's mind, and what else could make Cell the person he is when first meeting Piccolo in the main timeline). Also going into some images from the anime flashbacks, i.e. areas where human civilization looks really messed up and heavily armed, and generally connecting that to other apocalyptic stories' tendency to show society's disintegration and ruthless emphasis on survival. But all that filtered through Cell's perspective. Title references the _Ouroboros_.  
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**Disclaimer: I don't own anything related to Dragon Ball Z.**

_So this is how it ends_, the thought flitted through Cell's mind. All the other voices he had been created with offered their own visions of death (bodies blown up; blasts straight through the chest; pushing your being until there was nothing left). There were visions of what the Otherworld was like. But nothing could distract from the sun beating down on him, watching and burning and suffocating as every minute dragged by—

The bioandroid collapsed again, squeezing his eyes shut at the impact and the kicked up sand. Immediately he struggled to get up, his tail wavering as it tried to find balance again.

It had been a mistake to think he could cut across this desert before the demands of his incomplete body caught up with him. His damned stupid, imperfect, incompetent, _imperfectly incompetent _body, why did Father make him this way, it made no sense, _Father __**why**_—

Father was going to be so _disappointed_.

Cell hissed at himself, while he managed to get to his knees. He had to leave the emotional rambling behind—stop before it even really started—and gather his senses together. He tried to focus on calculating how long it had been since he last fed. It was approaching three weeks now. Cell had found nothing else alive since then, only the destruction 17 and 18 left in their wake. He had searched the ruins in vain, rotting shells of buildings filled only with useless human corpses. (Why couldn't Father have built him capable of eating any organic matter, not only the living kind.) The bioandroid had even looked for traces of beasts. Programming had always targeted human matter as the bio extract that would sustain him—but surely animals would count, he needed _anything_ right now to keep him going.

Cell found no beast to test his desperate theory on. Not that he could discern a place where they could even be found. It was not just devastated cities and villages he passed through, but stretches of dead land, and the bioandroid could not fathom why his brother and sister would target the woods as well.

His energy had dropped to the point that trying to fly would do more harm than good, not that he was ever that great at sustaining flight in the first place. Frankly, energy conservation had always been an issue, walking was typically more cost effective. And chalk that all up to another one of his current body's imperfections. And so, as it had become the norm, Cell walked, and walked. All the while, his hunger had grown, energy further dropping until he reached the desert.

Cell was confronted with the prospect of trading one dead land for another. (What a joke—as if the whole world wasn't dead already.)

But where else to go? With his energy failing, time and distance were precious. Could he really afford going backward? Or trying to find a way around the desert? What if there was a living, breathing human settlement just through that expanse of sand? And Cell had reasoned that the desert seemed to be in its natural state, rather than devastated by 17 and 18—thus hopefully it contained more life. Perhaps there were humans living in the desert itself. Besides, the feel of sand between his toes also broke up the monotony of swaths of stone and dirt he had traversed for days. The warmth of them refreshing, rather than the cold broken ground.

Now the grains of sand were burning into his exoskeleton. And Piccolo's genetic material grew more insistent in its desire for water, _water_...

Cell struggled a few more feet forward before collapsing again, and this time a darkness overtook him, so complete that it silenced all the voices, even Piccolo's.

The bioandroid grimaced, waking up as he heard a loud roar. Then his eyes snapped open. Roar. Life. Bio extract. Krillin's genetic memory further identified the sounds as that of a motorbike's roar. Motorbike. Vehicle. _Human rider_.

His first instinct was to bolt up and strike, but for once, it was beneficial that the weakness of his body restrained him. It was a reminder that he had to be cautious, had to think and plan (_quickly_) first. Cell had gone without feeding for so long, he was pitifully weak enough to be killed by a common human if they could get a hold of him.

_Humans_, Cell corrected, if the roar of more vehicular engines was any indication.

And so the bioandroid embraced his exhaustion and kept his eyes shut and body limp once the machines stopped and footsteps approached him, crunching in the sand.

"Ohmygod—"

"What the hell is that?!"

"A giant...cicada monster?"

"The bombs must've mutated the poor bastard—"

"Pity they couldn't do a thing against those Androids..."

The slightest mention of 17 and 18 made Cell's heart pound, but he tried to reign himself in, remind himself that once he absorbed these humans, he could comb through their memories to find any relevant intel on his life's directive.

Instead, Cell forced back the impulse to even flinch as a rough-but-shaking hand grabbed at him, lifting his head. He fully intended to play dead or unconscious, give into his body's weakness for the sake of the ruse...but that same weakness still diminished his own guard. It failed to keep his eyes from snapping open and him gagging as water—_cool, lifegiving, blessed __**water**_—splashed against his face as it tried to make itself down his throat, and he eagerly accepted it without thought, eagerly lapping and gulping down the water. The bioandroid just stared at the human woman who held his head and gave him water. _What was she_—_?_

"Vatz, what are you doing?!" Another woman demanded.

Eyes open, Cell slowly scanned the group of humans. They were a small group, and had come in jeeps and motorbikes. They were heavily armed. One was already clenching his gun and looking very fearfully at him. Cell knew that even a well aimed shot from such a weapon could kill him in his state. If it hit him.

The nervous gunman squeaked, "Y-yeah, you have no idea where the hell that thing's been, what if it _was_ mutated in the blasts, what if you get radiation poisoning—"

"Not my point!" Snarled that same woman who had first questioned Vatz, and Cell identified her this time; she was scarred, and missing an eye. "You're giving it _our_ water, our _rationed_ water—"

"But it—he could've died—"

Gohan's genetic memory told Cell that Vatz's motive was _compassion_, and also put a name to the reactive feelings that were infecting the bioandroid, besides sheer shock: _gratitude_, _guilt_, _hesitation_. He hungered for her and the other humans still, their lifeforce calling out to him, particularly loud to his starved state. And yet...maybe sparing just one human life would make no detrimental difference to him. He could afford to let her go. Let go the only person he recalled ever really truly helping him, outside of Gero and the computer—and their involvement was logical. This Vatz had no real logical reason for assisting him, nothing but this _compassion_ Gohan whispered, and others were whispering.

But then...it was not as if he gave anyone the chance to help him before, he had never been this vulnerable before, except maybe in the tank, but even the tank had protected him well enough from everything, including Androids 17 and 18's attempts to destroy all that was associated with Father...and then there was Frieza's voice. It whispered that the human who helped definitely had to die, she had seen his weakness, she could not be left alive after that...and yet, despite some of the context, still no one had _ever _helped him before, and Piccolo echoed this sentiment, threatening to drown Frieza's voice out. Perhaps because it was water the human had given, water that quenched Piccolo's genes (though the Namekian whispered fragments of long ago, _only one to ever treat me like a person_; and then a rush of grief and rage and love from Gohan's end).

"_Better it than us_!" That snapped Cell back to the present. Self interest and survival instinct were so much more logical, comprehensible, understandable after all.

"Food's rationed too," a larger man piped up in a low voice, and he tapped Cell's head crest with the end of his own rifle. "Back at the fort too. And we are, _right now_, looking for more supplies..."

Vatz's hand flinched and tightened around Cell's head. The bioandroid just sucked eagerly on her plastic bottle, while paying very close attention to the rest of the humans and their weapons.

"Y-yeah," someone else said, "my gran would feed me grasshoppers, beetles when we had to, before the fort..."

"And that's the biggest damn insect I've ever seen—"

"I can see the soft bits, in the face there—"

"It definitely has _meat _on those bones—"

Cell welcomed the sense of amusement that seized him. These humans actually thought they would be eating _him_.

"But," Vatz began, her voice shaking as bad as her hands before.

"_Vatz_," hissed the one-eyed woman. Cell felt nothing when Vatz let go of his head and the bottle and she swiftly moved away from him, as if she did fear he had poisoned her with radiation by his very touch alone, as if she had believed the earlier brainstorming.

Cell merely saw an opportunity.

Focusing on speed and what little energy he had left, the bioandroid bolted up, throwing a screaming Vatz into one of the other humans with a sharp whip of his tail, also intent on kicking up a wave of sand as the tail ran through the grains.

The chaos was loud and fast. Some of the humans screamed over the sand straight in their eyes, or cutting across their goggles' line of sight, and then there was simply the terror of the unknown, of an ambush. There was also shouting, and so much gunfire. A bullet grazed Cell's cheek, and he felt the shock of breaking skin. The bioandroid continued forward, jumping toward a jeep and yanking out the human left to guard it. His speed had been enough to catch the human by surprise and avoid a lethal shot, but still another blast glanced off the tip of his head crest. Cell pulled the struggling human to the other side of the jeep, and started to quickly feed while the other humans peppered his makeshift cover with their bullets.

It felt so good to have something fill his being again, to sate even a fraction of his hunger. Hopefully this one burst of energy would be enough to secure his survival against the other humans. His reflexes were clearly sharpening, as Cell batted away a grenade that was tossed his way. And thankfully he remembered to bat it to the side, and not right back to the humans. They would die when he ate them, and not before; if they died before, they would be inedible, as experience had intolerably taught him.

Cell heard the rush of liquid, and analyzed the sound; he was not bleeding nearly enough for that; he was cleaner than that when he fed, he had to absorb everything in a human, blood and all; the other humans could not be bleeding enough for that, he had avoided piercing or seriously striking them, unless they had actually hit each other with their gunfire in the chaos.

Then he realized the gunfire had made holes in the jeep's gas tank.

Smirking, Cell bent over clothes his victim had left behind, and begn to rapidly dig through the sand. Even one bio extraction had done the trick; he still had to be cautious and quick, for he remained vulnerable enough to die at a common human's hands, but still he felt invigiorated, even if some of that was just in his head. Renewed confidence would be enough for this fight.

Cell rapidly carved a tunnel and swiftly made his way down, his hands and feet and tail still digging as the sound of gunfire grew more muffled. His smirk deepened as he finally heard the jeep's pierced gas tank ignite. And perhaps the humans were not being so careless and derailed by their own panic; perhaps that had been their strategy, ignite an inferno on top of him. Probably thought it succeeded, that he was dead, and his corpse ripe for the skinning and feeding, not to mention already well cooked.

Pity for them that he had his own strategy.

The bioandroid followed the pulse of the humans' life force from underground, and carefully positioned himself beneath them. Then he broke through the sand, and his tail darted and sunk into something soft with a satisfying crunch.

###

One last human moved, and Cell knew it was Vatz, the watergiver, by process of elimination: he had not seen her beneath his stinger, nor had he looked for her until now. His eyes scanned the blood trail she left behind, and the bullet holes along her body, all the way up to a pierced cheek, and a pierced lung, if her labored breathing and blood bubbling at her mouth were anything to go by. He had noticed other humans accidentally shot each other in the chaos—thankfully none of the misfire was lethal, he had still been able to absorb them all—but none as badly as her.

The bioandroid approached her, feet treading over the already familiar sensation of emptied clothes. She twitched, and Cell wondered if she had tried to retreat, even now. And yet it was something he thought he understood better. That desperation to live.

"You probably won't last long like this," Cell growled out, his voice unused to speaking, and he struggled to remember the last time he had done so, if at all. Was this the first time? Not like he had any reason for conversation, not with living most of his life silent in a tank, not with everything already dead around him when he finally could walk the earth, and then he would only feed on whatever life he could find, rather than strike up idle chit chat with them...

"And that looks like it burns," Cell said, his voice slow as it savored the way comprehensible sounds left his mouth; he could get used to personally doing this "talking" thing.

The last human lifted a bloodied hand, and in it was a gun. The bioandroid simply stared at it, nonplussed.

But Cell blinked when she turned the gun on herself.

Without meaning to, he tensed as she pulled the trigger—then gaped, as it clicked harmlessly. Even he was surprised at her bad luck. An incredulous, unbelieving fit of laughter left him.

Watergiver Vatz looked aghast at her weapon, at its thorough betrayal. Then she looked to him, complete terror filling her eyes (and him filling up with a certain thrill from Frieza's genes). Pleading made them start to water.

"Please, not like...like this, don't want...I can't just disappear like the rest..."

Tilting his head, Cell explained. "They were absorbed, they did not 'disappear.' They have gone into my body, consumed for my own sustennance—as you had planned to consume me for yours. Am I right?" The bioandroid idly poked at an empty jacket with his tail. "That's clear enough, isn't it?"

"Please—"

"They've gone to a grander purpose, sustaining and empowering my own body, until I can reach perfection..." It felt good to say that out loud, to try the actual words out on his tongue. And to voice that reassurance—once he was complete, the hunger would disappear. He would be free from feeding on pitiful mewling bio extract such as this.

Cell moved his tail, and the dying human shivered and whimpered as the stinger came close, right up to her face. Sometimes he had fed from that point of the body before.

The bioandroid paused. Then he said, "I've been sated well enough for now, and you were unnecessarily kind to me." Instead he quickly wrapped his tail around her neck, cleanly snapping it before she could register or feel anything more.

Leaving the body, Cell began rummaging through the clothes, the vehicles, looking for a map. The vehicles left tracks to follow, but another reference, one that he could hold in his hands, would be great. And still his mind painstakingly shifted through the new bio extracts' memories, looking for relevant information on where their "fort" was, something one of the humans mentioned. All of this, because he wanted to know where his next meal would be. (And of course, any possible information on 17 and 18.)

Cell paused over intact canteens and bottles of water (some had been pierced by gunfire and left with their precious liquids spilling). Piccolo's genes no longer thirsted, not after the human's water, and especially not after he had some bio extract filling him—but who knew how long they would be sated, or how much longer he would be stuck in this desert.

He then considered the remaining vehicles. He soon found that only one motorbike was in the best shape for a ride, the others had been damaged by the battle. Even better, it still had the key in ignition. While Cell picked up an abandoned pair of goggles and experimentally tried them on, he reasoned that riding a vehicle may conserve some of his energy while in the desert, and it would be a way to carry some water with him. He had to take maximum advantage of his good fortune and act more carefully while travelling through such harsh terrain; trying to actually carry supplies and exploring an alternate mode of transportation was one way of going about that.

That, and if he actually knew where the hell he was... Searching through bio extracts' memories tended to be a slow and uncomfortable process. He had not pinpointed anything useful so far, and he was growing fairly certain that these humans had known nothing relevant about the anrdoids he needed. The latter was not very surprising, and more of a familiar disappointment; none of the other bio extract he had absorbed before provided anything concrete about 17 and 18 either.

Cell's tail happily waved once he finally found a map. Scanning it, he smirked, tapping the circled "fort" on the paper. Surely it would not be too far from his current location; the human group had not been stocked for a long excursion. They would have stayed close to home. And of course, there were their wheel tracks to follow.

The bioandroid still had to be careful when approaching this fort, but this batch of humans had given him enough energy (and confidence) to go on.

As Cell packed the motorbike and recalled Krillin's memories of riding one, he noticed carrion birds swoop in, toward the one human body left behind.

He watched them feed for a moment, tear and rip flesh. Swallow with relish. Then he snapped the goggles on, mounted the motorbike, and rode away.

**A/N: Irontonic actually has an illustration of Imperfect Cell wearing goggles and riding a motorbike, and I just fell in love with that image. Thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed. Feedback is always appreciated.**


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